Tutorial Thursday
What was going on this week at CyberNet News and Learn Firefox? Here’s your chance to catch-up if you missed something!
I periodically receive inquiries from friends asking for the easiest way to access files and folders on a FTP server. They normally have their own FTP server setup at home, and they want to ensure fast access to their files without having to mess with third-party applications. Is it possible to quickly map a FTP to a drive? You bet!
The solution I’m about to show you doesn’t exactly assign a drive letter to the FTP server, but it will essentially serve the same purpose as a drive. Through Windows Explorer you’ll have one-click access to your files, and they will even be accessible through the standard Open/Save dialog boxes in apps such as Microsoft Word.
Here’s how you can set it up:
- Open Windows Explorer and choose the “Map Network Drive” option.
Vista location: Along the top toolbar
XP location: Tools Menu
- Choose the option at the bottom that reads:
Vista: “Connect to a Web site that you can use to store your documents and pictures”
XP: “Sign up for online storage or connect to a network server”
- Click “Choose a custom network location”:
- Enter in the FTP address for the site:
- Enter the username for the FTP server (you will be prompted for the password when you connect):
- Enter a name:
- Finish up the wizard, and then you’ll be ready to connect! You’ll be prompted for the password the first time that you try and connect, but you can have the password saved after that if you wish.
That process will take less than 30-seconds to complete after you become familiar with doing it. There is a way to assign a drive letter to a FTP server, but it does take some addition work. I’ve found three sources that try to make it a little easier:
- Tutorial – This is a relatively quick process and would be my first choice out of the three mentioned here. It requires no third-party apps to make it work, and it truly lets you map a FTP server to a drive. It does require using the command line.
- NetDrive – This is a free program offered by Novell that has a GUI interface for setting up FTP servers as drives on your computer.
- FTP Drive – This is a small free program that also brings a GUI interface to the configuration, but the program always has to be running if you want the mapped drive to work.
While those solutions make it possible to assign a drive letter to the FTP, I don’t see an added advantage by doing so. The steps that I walked you through in this article will give nearly every program access to your FTP, and it is super easy to setup. I’m sure there is some reason that you would want a drive letter though…I just haven’t found them. 
There IS actually a tool that maps FTPs as a drive letter. It also maps WebDAV and iFolder. It’s called WebDrive ([webdrive.com] ). Unfortunately, it’s not free. Luckily, a while ago Novell released a program called NetDrive that was essentially a rebranded WebDrive. While they don’t distribute it anymore, it IS still floating around. Here’s one link:
[freewaregenius.com]
For Mac users, use Mac Fusion:
[sccs.swarthmore.edu]
That first option isn’t going to work… NetBEUI hasn’t been around for a very long time.
I actually linked to that in the article, along with another free program. I mentioned both at the end in a list of three alternative methods.
You can actually get it on XP, and I meant to link to it in the article:
[support.microsoft.com]
I am not sure about this on Vista, but on XP I found mapping a drive to an FTP server to be a very bad idea, Every time I opened up a new explorer window, XP would open a connection to the FTP server and get its file listing; thus introducing a very long delay. Same long delay nearly every time a file Open/Save dialog was opened in any application. I did not try to resolve this, and just removed the mapping.
Everytime you opened Explorer? That doesn’t sound right. It’s not doing that in Vista.
2 questions
how do you do a copy to the ftp “drive” in DOS (batch file)?
how do you disconnect?
jpg
I haven’t done it in a batch file before so I’m not quite sure, sorry.
Is there a way to do this to connect to an SSH server?
I assume you’re wanting to connect via SFTP? Unfortunately I haven’t seen any free solutions to do that type of stuff.
I use a tunnel to fool the Windows ftp into thinking my ssh server is a ftp server. This way I get the ftp connectivity, but encrypted. The only drawback is you need a third-party application running (I have it in the background).
Download Bitvise Tunnelier (it’s free and available portable). Enable its FTP-to-SFTP bridge and connect to your ssh server. Then when Windows asks for your ftp server, type “ftp://localhost/”
It works smoothly and best of all, all connections are encrypted.
I use Bitvise Tunnelier to tunnel all sorts of connections like VNC and WebDAV. I can connect to any port with only the ssh port open to the public. I love it!
Very clever idea to connect to an SSH server, I’m going to try this now
To copy using ftp and batch command you may use -s switch
ftp -s:command_file
-s switch specifies a text file containing FTP commands; the commands will automatically run after FTP starts.
When I’m trying to open file using vista mapper – I get a firefox window asking me a password. NetDrive is much better.
I’m try to map ftp://cypernetnews.com as the examples. After I finish the error message is:” Windows cannot access this folder. Make sure you typed the file name correctly and that you have permission to access this folder.”
Have you ever meet this error? Have anybody help me? Thank you very much!
I map FTP folders to drive letters so I can edit files on them remotely using my IDE.